AMERICAN PIE: A PROPHECY?

Don McLean wrote that song in 1972. I was a Boy Scout then. We used to sit around the campsite and pick the lyrics apart, line by line, and figure out what each item meant. On the surface, it was an easy thing to pick out the references to dead and defunct pop musicians. "The day the music died." Simple.
Too simple, perhaps. Many people who wrote the music died, all right, but not their music. Back then, talent went a long way. You could record a song with your friends in your garage, send the records to radio stations across the country, and have a hit. It was even possible to make it with just a single song (one-hit wonder). No video. No agents. No Hollywood.
Radio stations back then weren't so stuck up. The news followed by "Rainy Days and Mondays" (The Carpenters), then "Immigrant Song" (Led Zeppelin), possibly "Kiss An Angel Good Morning" (Charley Pride), and a seasonal "Monster Mash" (Bobby Boris Pickett) thrown on top. All of it part of the American Top 40, shared by everybody at the parks, in the restaurants, at parties. Just a great big wonderful music melting pot. Pop artists even had the audacity to sing about Jesus Christ.
Fast-forward thrity years. Now we have niche music. We're supposed to like what is shoved down our throats. First, the promoters decide what group we're in. Chick-rock, hip-hop, country, Christian, jazz, alternative, classic rock, oldies, the eighties, reggae, screw music, what-have-you. We must only have music appropriate for our group. Have you ever heard "screw music"? It's somebody else's music played s-l-o-w. Lotsa talent there! There isn't a variety radio station. My car radio has 18 preset buttons. You'd think by pushing random buttons I could get variety, but it seems ClearChannel owns most of the stations so they all play the same commercials at the same time. I can't find much new music, and even when I find something I like, no one I know has heard of it. If fact, even the kids I know have just given up. They listen to "oldies"! Surely talent still exists, but it's trampled down by an industry that demands videos, tours, agents, and sex appeal. The music is dying. Is this what Don McLean saw coming?
Warning: this is the scary part. Think about Hurricane Katrina. See if the lyrics take on a deeper meaning now...
"...the men there said the music wouldn't play. And the three men I admire the most: the Father, Son, and the Holy Ghost-- They caught the last train for the coast, the day the music died. And they were singing: 'Bye, bye this American pie, drove my Chevy to the levy but the levy was dry. And good ol' boys were drinkin' whiskey and rye, singin' this'll be the day that I die."